Supercritical CO2 Extraction of Essential Oil from Myrtus Communis Berries

Proceedings (senza ISBN) della Conferenza "CISF99 - Fifth Italian Conference on Supercritical Fluids and their Applications", Garda (VR), 13-16 giugno 1999. - An investigation of the application of supercritical carbon dioxide extraction to the production of essential oils from myrtle berries has been made to verify that the properties of the oil remain essentially unchanged when this technique is applied. Yield and composition (related quantity of the main components) have been used for comparing the performance of the supercritical extraction and hydrodistillation. The presence of a high molecular weight compound (a dione) in the extract and a higher yield of essential oil are the main evident differences between the supercritical extraction and the traditional hydrodistillation